Ligonier Valley Rail Road Newspaper Articles
We have compiled over 1,400 newspaper articles that mention the Ligonier Valley Railroad, or related subjects. The articles were originally published starting in 1873 and our collection runs through 1995. Enjoy!
Ligonier Echo
Wednesday, December 13, 1905
Nearing Completion
The P. W. & S. Railway To Somerset From Ligonier
Somerset, Pa., Dec. 7. Early completion is promised of the new Pittsburg,
Westmoreland & Somerset railroad from Ligonier to Somerset, making Somerset its
eastern terminus and connection with the Somerset & Cambria branch of the Baltimore & Ohio Pittsburgh division just north of the Somerset borough line, where 18 acres of land have been purchased for station, yards and other facilities. The new railroad is virtually an extension of the Ligonier Valley line extending from Latrobe, on the Pennsylvania, to Ligonier.
Vanderbilt's engineers found for him the key to the way across the Alleghenies. He deliberately threw it away. More than $15,000,000 had been spent on the South Penn when the giant enterprise was abandoned. In the compromise of 1885 between the Pennsylvania railroad and Vanderbilt the latter acquired the West Shore railroad, a competitor of the New York Central. Vanderbilt then sold the unfinished South Penn to the Pennsylvania, but the courts held that the Pennsylvania could not acquire a parallel road under the Constitution of Pennsylvania. Thus the South Penn was abandoned. Its
charter privileges lapsed, and the consecutive strips of right of way which had been purchased in fee simple were assessed and taxed, and finally all the rights of way were sold at tax sales. The Pittsburg, Westmoreland & Somerset railroad purchased our miles of these tax titles and located its road on them.